England Lions to arrive with bunch of veterans, aspirants

Thiruvananthapuram, Jan 12 (IANS) The visiting England Lions cricket team, which will land here in the wee hours of Sunday, consists of a bunch of veterans and aspirants. The visitors are scheduled to play five one-dayers here and a four-day match at the picturesque Wayanad Cricket stadium, all against the India A team. The 50-over matches will be held here on January 23, 25, 27, 29 and 31 at the state of the art Greenfield Stadium, while the four day match begins on February 7. The veterans are all in the coaching team, which consists of flamboyant Zimbabwean opener Andy Flower, who is the head coach. Those under him include former opener Jonathan Trott, spinner Peter Such and wicket-keeper Bruce French. The squad includes wicket-keeper batsman Sam Billings, Ben Ducket and Ollie Pope, who all have donned the English colours, with Pope playing against India in two tests in England last year. The England Lions will begin their practice here from the January 14 and would play warm-up matches against the Board President's XI. The India A team arrives here on the January 20. Renjith Thomas, a former state cricketer now attached to the Kerala Cricket Association, told IANS that the matches would be open to all cricketing buffs for free. --IANS asg/kk/vm